I bit ago I made a post detailing the Egg prime directive in Egg irl. To be clear that was a policy post but it also helped outline the concept in a way that many people don’t do. Most descriptions of the Egg prime directive are either incomplete or, purposefully uncharitable. So it’s good to clarify it.

This is a different kind of post, unlike that one it’s not a policy post in regards to community enforcement, it’s more meant to address the issue in a general sense.

Today I’m going to talk about why the Egg Prime Directive is important, and also more importantly, why people disagreeing with it or not following it isn’t acceptable.

First why does it matter? Well I discussed it heavily in my other post but the gist of it is that it is important to respect the way a person identifies themselves, the pronouns they use, the label they call themselves. Regardless of how they look or present themselves. It seems like a pretty fundamental concept that there shouldn’t be any issue with, yet somehow many people seem to have an issue with it and don’t do it. When a person’s identity isn’t respected it can be deeply hurtful and is ultimately deeply disrespectful to them.

Why ‘disagreement’ with the egg is problematic at best? Well the thing is, because the Egg Prime Directive is solely about respecting the way a person identifies themselves and their autonomy to identify themselves in a way that they see fit, to argue against it is to argue against people’s validity to self-identification. It’s not much different from arguing against certain aspects of trans rights. Ultimately many instances where people break the Egg Prime Directive are targeting individuals who are Gender-Nonconforming or even NonBinary.

Some people argue that they should be able to break it to fight cisnormativity. However this is a very poor justification to try and make it seem okay to violate someone else’s gender identification and ultimately isn’t being done for their benefit, it is going against their right to identify as any gender or use any label they feel like. To be clear, they have that right, all the time. The idea that someone doesn’t have the right to identify as their preferred gender or label in certain circumstances is downright dystopian.

Bottom line, there is no such thing as respectful disagreement with this concept, going against the Egg Prime Directive is solely an act of going against another person’s identification. It isn’t respectful to them as a person. It’s very similar to “respectful transmedicalism” or “respectful transphobia” in this regard. It is a harmful behavior made out as if it’s respectful or good.

Oh and By the way. Before someone tries to argue that Egging is “politely explaining what trans means to someone” this subject has been covered in the last post and respectful support and education is NOT Egging, and is freely allowed by the Egg prime directive, if not explicitly encouraged, trying to argue as if it somehow isn’t is disingenuous, and frankly seems extremely uncharitable.

  • Kaja • she/her@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
    29·
    2 days ago

    My problem with defences of the “egg prime directive” is that it’s blatantly transphobic, and frames cisness as an inherently natural correct state while transness is something only a select few do. Encouraging someone to question their gender isn’t the same as denying them their gender identity, you can at the same time identify ways that someone seems to be having a similar experience as many trans people do before coming out while totally accepting that they are what they are right now.

    I’ll be honest, it feels like a rebranding of the old homophobic defense of homosexuality, that it’s a small percentage of the population that suffers from this condition, so we should be nice to that select few, but oh no don’t you go implying morally upstanding people like me or my child could be one of those people.

    It didn’t have a cutesy name associated with it, but it’s similar to why “born this way” was criticized when that framing was used for gay existence and why it played into a conservative framing of queerness: it’s a thing the degenerates do over there, but if they try to come into polite society and try to do things like talk to kids about being gay, it’s not because they’re trying to reach out to gay kids who might be in unsupportive environments where being gay is never presented to them as a thing they might apply to them, it’s because they’re sickos who are trying to groom kids into becoming like them.

    In a time when countries are trying to make trans people legally not exist and forbid people from even being able to talk about them, I could not imagine a worse time to stop talking to people about transness and that people who don’t identify as trans might be trans. Our enemies will definitely happily tell anyone experiencing dissatisfaction with their AGAB that they’re definitely not trans just shy/not (wo)manly enough/needing conversion therapy/etc, so why let them control the conversation about who can or can’t be trans?

    • TotallynotJessica@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
      2·
      1 day ago

      Talking about your own lived experience or the experience of other trans people? Amazing! Encouraging a specific person, unprompted, to question their gender? Fundamentally not a good idea.

      The whole problem is your assumption that unsolicited advice is a good idea. It rarely is. When genuinely trying to help people, it’s more useful be clear that you’re talking about your own perspective and your own situation. This will be much better received, and it will not make normative assumptions about how others ought to act. Saying what people should do is the real problem with egging. It unnecessarily orders people to think about their gender rather than giving them the tools to do it themselves. If they are an egg, they’ll use those tools when they’re ready.

    • First Majestic Comet@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOPEnglish
      8·
      2 days ago

      You missed the mark so much that I don’t think you read what I wrote in either case, and/or this is the most uncharitable, bad faith interpretation you could think of. Trying to smear me and the topic at hand as well as going extremely far off the rails.

      There are many uncharitable readings of the Egg Prime Directive and this one you came up with is very high on the list, and honestly, this comes off as extremely disrespectful when the only thing you are asked to do is to not directly challenge or debate someone else on their gender identity as if you have the right to somehow arbitrate who they are and how they identify. That’s it, it doesn’t say anything else about not discussing transness or queerness with them, or denying them access to information. In fact I literally said:

      respectful support and education is NOT Egging, and is freely allowed by the Egg prime directive, if not explicitly encouraged

      This part about denying information to people is a bad faith argument that people made up to paint the idea of having rules for basic levels or respect in someone’s labels or pronouns as if it’s a bad thing, and it’s honestly a pretty disgusting lie at that.